Travelling With a Baby
I recently received a couple of requests to put together some tips for travelling with a baby or toddler and so over the past couple of weeks I’ve been reflecting on what has worked best (and what hasn’t worked!) in the past year-and-a-bit of Ines’ life. I know that travel with a child in tow can be a daunting prospect, the intricate calculations often weighed against the desperate need for a break and change of scene, or to visit family and friends in other parts of the world. It can also be extremely rewarding to see them take in new places and faces and spend some quality time together outside the day-to-day routine of your home. There are many excellent posts out there with practical things you can do, like feeding your baby on take-off and landing to help with the pressure changes or bringing lots of snacks wherever you go (truly a vital piece of information), but I did want to reflect a bit more broadly about the whole topic. There’s no ground-breaking information in here, but just in case you haven’t travelled with your baby yet or you are interested to see what works for us, I hope it’s helpful.
I spent a lot of time in Ines’ first year travelling around the UK visiting friends and family that didn’t live nearby, we went often to the farm, and we also moved out of our house for a few weeks (not travel exactly, but her environment was constantly in flux). I feel like all these smaller trips were very helpful in pushing me outside my comfort zone and figuring out what it meant to travel with a baby and how best to navigate it all. So that would really be my first piece of advice; if you are reading this and you’re about to have a baby or have a young baby, try and get out and do some of these things sooner rather than later, even if it’s just starting small, like one- or two-night stays somewhere else (could be a family member or friend’s house!). I don’t mean right in the first few weeks or months, but as soon as you sense you might need a change of scene. Sometimes the biggest barrier is not your baby, but yourself. I think this probably also applies to being in restaurants and other public places. The more you do it, the more confident you’ll be doing it and the more accustomed to those environments your baby will be. Restaurants particularly can be overstimulating and loud places, but if your baby gets used to seeing lots of other people and all the hubbub, I think that can be so helpful further down the line. I know this has been so hard the past couple of years with pandemic babies, and we were lucky that not too long after Ines was born, things started opening back up so we could ease ourselves in.
Along with practising getting out of your comfort zone when possible, adjusting your expectations is my other biggest piece of advice. To be honest, it doesn’t just apply to travelling but really to parenting in general. It’s good to remind yourself that the only things you can control are yourself and your own responses, not your baby’s. I try and be flexible and relaxed about things that don’t go perfectly, or even particularly well. I vividly remember just giving up on a dinner we had planned in Edinburgh because I could tell there was no way we were going to get through it without a lot of frustration and crying (I think she was dropping a nap at the time… Yikes!). And it doesn’t hurt that the more relaxed you are, the likelihood is, your baby will be more relaxed, too. When we’re travelling, I have an anything goes attitude. Within reason, whatever gets us through in one piece and with maximum enjoyment for everyone goes, as I’m sure you will see from the remainder of this post. For example, whilst I would say I’m pretty laidback even at home (everything in moderation!), I do relax on things like screen time and eating when we’re travelling. I like to think that all the new stimuli and quality time with mum and dad usually make up for any imbalance somewhere else. I’ve really learnt this the hard way, too, by being too strict about certain things in some of our early trips (particularly with regard to sleep!) and ruining the trip for myself more than anything else. If you’d like to hear more about that, let me know.
Finally, before we begin in earnest, I have gone back and forth with this post more times than I can count. I don’t know why I’m particularly in my head about it, but for some reason just can’t seem to be happy with it! I think it’s a tone thing; I don’t want anyone to think that I think I know everything about travelling with a child - I certainly don’t! And I toyed with taking things out or leaving other bits in, wondering if they were too specific to how I parent, and my particular child. So whilst I am giving advice, please take it with a huge pinch of salt and follow your own instincts, always. I did however want to throw in a few things I’ve learnt, and also for this post to hopefully reassure you that travel with a baby isn’t always easy, and it’s okay to ease up on yourself and your baby. As I said, I’ve learnt this the hard way over many trips of all different kinds, and I’d love to help someone else avoid some of the heartache that parents – particularly mums – seem to put themselves through trying to maintain certain standards of parenting while on the go.
Plane
Ah, the dreaded plane journey. First thing to note is that whilst everyone feels differently, I much prefer travelling with a toddler than a baby, because toddlers are so much more entertainable. And this is coming from someone with a child that – at home – is constantly on the go, always moving. It is absolutely doable, but I did find plane journeys with an infant harder, as they are not interested in watching a show nor can they eat endless snacks. This depends on your baby though. With Ines, there were a few months (3-5?) where we really relied on being able to stand up and walk around the room rocking her to calm her or help her drift off to sleep (apparently sitting down rocking was not good enough). This is obviously nigh-on impossible on a plane, especially during take-off and landing. And being a little bit of an anxious flyer I wasn’t totally keen on walking up and down the aisle. However, if they’ll happily drift off in your arms or while feeding, you’ll be totally fine! Funnily enough, for over a year she has fed to sleep in my arms no problem, so it also doesn’t last forever even if that sounds familiar. Anyway, if you are travelling with a younger baby, try and time the flight with a nap. Let them get a little tired in the airport and don’t let them sleep too much if you can manage it so that by the time you’re on the plane they’re ready for a nice long nap. I didn’t do this once and regretted every second of the wake window we were in on the plane. If they’re really little like under three months, they’ll probably sleep right through anyway, especially if they are in a carrier! When Ines was around six months I did find the new, unfamiliar toys thing useful, so I’d recommend having a few to hand. For all ages, an overnight flight is a great shout if you are going long haul. Again, I let Ines get a little tired, get her into her pj’s at the start of the flight and do whatever I can from our normal bedtime routine – for us, this is feeding to sleep, but perhaps it might be a familiar book or song, or a rock after takeoff – to help them relax. You will be pinned under a baby all night, but it is at least peaceful. On both our big trips this year we had to travel in the daytime on the way out and overnight on the way back but she was around 12 months, so she was at the more entertainable end of babyhood by that point.
So, the more entertainable toddler. To be honest I don’t recommend bringing huge amounts of toys; they just get everywhere and for a younger child who does less imaginative play, it might be difficult for them to have lengthy involved play with toys. I usually bring a few books and toys (again, new ones might help!), but at the end of the day, the most effective thing for us has been films. I’m looking forward to the colouring and activity books days that await us, but right now at this age, screen time is my best bet. Ines is not particularly good at wearing her (kid-friendly!) headphones at the moment so she will either watch a film silently or on extremely low volume – the white noise of the plane usually covers it up for other passengers (don’t worry, we check). A bit of headphone training at home might help, though. I know everyone has different approaches to screen time (my approach is very similar to Jess’ at @ourmamavillage on Instagram – check out her highlight on the topic!), but as Ines is familiar with certain things she watches at home, she was engaged with them on the plane and could watch them practically soundless too. If you do have a big trip coming up that you’re nervous about and you’re not sure if your toddler would sit and watch something, it might be worth trying a few things out at home to see what they like best. Kids love repetition and will watch something they love to death, so something they have a bit of familiarity with is good. As a former Disney kid myself, we are big on films in this house.
And of course, food. I am not the mum that is super organised when it comes to food; always got a tupperware full of halved grapes and batons of cucumber. But if there’s one time I’d recommend packing a lunchbox properly, it’s for the plane. Plane food for babies and toddlers is rubbish, especially if you do baby-led weaning. On our flight out to America, I think Ines spent over an hour slowly chomping her way through her lunchbox whilst she watched something. Bliss! But also just bring all the snacks, more snacks than you think you’ll need.
Car
Whilst on our recent trip to the states, I got a lot of questions about how I helped Ines deal with the long road trips. Firstly, we plan any long car trip around the baby as much as possible. We did do one 10-hour car journey, but all the others weren’t longer than seven hours as we thought that was about right for her. We usually leave just before her first nap time, or at least a couple hours after she wakes up so she is ready for a nap soon enough. Once again, I find extended car travel much easier with an older child, but it is also a little bit of practice makes perfect, too. There was a time – again when she was in that tricky three-to-five-month age I reckon – when she did not like being in the car. Once a nap was over she got bored very quickly but was very difficult to entertain, and there was a lot of screaming. By the time she was seven months, we were doing four- or five-hour journeys with ease. As with everything, it is always just a phase. But as I say, we do drive up and down the country to visit family and friends quite often, so starting with smaller trips and building up can help your baby get used to the car and your little road trip routine. Crying in the car is tough to hear, but if you are with your baby and trying to offer comfort (and identify any discomfort!), just know you are doing your best and it is sometimes unavoidable so that you can do something special together as a family.
Here's how we do it:
The First Leg – as I say, we leave around naptime or not long before (we’ll wake her earlier than usual if we want to leave earlier). These days she’s usually happy to listen to the radio or anything really while she waits to drift off, but sometimes we have to start on her special music to help her along. As I say, she loves her Disney films so this is often a soundtrack of some kind but helping your baby enjoy music can be such a helpful tool in all sorts of situations, particularly the car. Play them things at home and see what they really respond to. Then play them again and again. This worked when she was much younger in the non-entertainable age, too.
The First Leg, cont. - We would drag this leg out as long as possible. Usually, she sleeps longer in the car than she does in her cot at home, so we can get about ninety minutes, perhaps more. Then when she wakes she is usually happy to sit and ponder life for a bit (practice makes perfect on this one! Took her a while to get used to the car and what it means i.e. being strapped into the chair and forced to make her own entertainment). This might be when we crack out her tunes, too, just to keep her going a little longer before we stop.
A Break – When she starts getting whiny, we’ll stop for our break. This will usually be a much more extended break than Zak and I would have taken pre-baby. We sit and have a proper lunch, stretch our legs, change nappy, have some milk and just take a breather.
The Second Leg – So obviously this is not possible if it’s just you and your little one (in which case it’s more music and hoping for the best!), but this is when I usually hop in the back to oversee baby entertainment. When she was younger this would usually involve a series of toys and books with greater or lesser success, along with a video or two. Now she’s older we’ll chat together, play little games and then she’ll settle in to watch a film while I supervise. A note: guided access on iPhones/iPads can lock the screen and prevent your baby from swiping off their show or otherwise messing with it. She is finally getting back into her books, too, so the other day she had a look through various books for a while which reminded me of all my childhood road trips! For a time she just was not interested, and that’s okay! I always try different things just to see what works. Next time I’ll bring even more books.
A Small Break – We don’t always take a second break depending on how we’re getting on, but sometimes on a particularly long journey, Ines will start to get tired again and so we will take a small break and reset, maybe have a quick snack. On the really long trips we might stretch this break out a bit longer, too.
The Final Leg – I’ll hop back into the front (Ines finds it hard to sleep when someone is in the back with her!) and let her drift off again to some music. She’s a one-nap girl usually but sometimes the second nap is unavoidable, especially on a road trip, so we just accept it’ll be a later bedtime when this happens.
Sleep
The best thing to do about sleep is to expect it to be disturbed unless you have a magical unicorn baby. It’s probably helpful to know that we are not just flexible with sleep when we’re away but also at home, too. I can never commit to a schedule personally and so any attempt I’ve made in the past to get Ines on one too has never worked for us. It will maybe be more jarring travelling when you do have a good schedule going at home, particularly with jet lag, but again it is absolutely possible. And maybe your baby will surprise you! We do have a good bedtime routine though, and this is helpful in general, but particularly so when travelling to make the unfamiliar feel familiar. Doing your bedtime routine as close as possible to how you do it at home is going to help your baby feel relaxed and ready to sleep.
With jet lag I try and manipulate the naps so that there is a lot of sleep pressure when it gets to night-time at the new place, and I do this as soon as possible. This might mean either a late (or very late!) bedtime on arrival so we get that sleep pressure starting to build, or a strategic late or second nap to push it out a bit further if she’s likely to get tired too early. We’re very lucky that Ines doesn’t get too upset when she’s tired and I know that it is trickier with some babies; sending much love to you if your little one struggles more with this when you travel! Each will be a little different as to how far you can push sleep out, and how long it takes them to adjust. Sure, we have had instances where she is awake for a couple of hours in the middle of the night at first, but I very boringly lie there in the dark cuddling her and feeding her until she finally goes back to sleep, and we get up in the morning at a decent ‘morning’ time.
Hotel
Most hotels will have a cot you can use. Ideally, the room would have a bathroom with a door on it and said bathroom would be big enough to hold a travel cot. This means that Zak and I can stay up later in the room and don’t always have to go to bed at the same time as the baby. Yes, we put her in the bathroom! Yes, it totally works for us for a few hours! Then, as we do at home, we bedshare for the remainder of the night. One of my major non-negotiables is a big enough bed for us to do this comfortably. The bathroom thing is less of a non-negotiable, we just have to go to bed earlier if it’s not possible, or we have also watched something on the iPad with an earphone each while she sleeps. Holidaying with a baby is a very different experience from holidaying pre-baby, and it can take a while to adjust mentally to the fact that it is harder work and you don’t have the same freedoms as you did before, especially in the evening. But once that adjustment is made, it really is special to make memories on the road with your loved ones. And I’m hoping further down the line Zak and I can take trips by ourselves if we really want to have proper downtime and quality time together, though we haven’t felt ready to leave Ines without either of us just yet. Being on holiday with a baby can actually mean you get less partner time than you do at home; it’s probably not the time to expect to really connect with them specifically, but rather make memories as a family.
Home
If we’re staying in a holiday home or someone’s house, we try to make the environment as close to home as possible, and doing this you have a much greater chance of having your evenings, too. Worth thinking about when you’re booking a trip! Depending on the place you might need your own travel cot and travel highchair. I also bring more toys and books when we’re at a home to keep Ines occupied as there’s less chance we’ll be out and about like we are when we’re staying in hotels. I’ll bring all our blackout stuff too, like the SlumberPod, which I much prefer to the portable blackout blinds you can buy. As I say when we’re at a hotel we’re much more likely to be out and about during the day, so there’s less requirement for this for naps as she’ll have them on the go, and she’s usually in bed later too after we’ve had dinner. When we’re at a house we stick a little closer to our home routines, and she’ll probably go to bed earlier, so stuff to make her sleep space dark is more helpful. Obviously, we go nowhere without our white noise machine, too!
Eat
Like I said earlier, I’m relaxed and easy on myself when it comes to food when travelling. You will have to eat for convenience sometimes, and not everywhere is geared towards children. We do often order from kids’ menus, but there is a limit to the number of chicken nuggets one child can eat (why are kids’ menus so boring, please!?), so another nice thing to do is just give them bits of your own meals, especially when they’re still quite little. Or sometimes we would order her a simple starter or side. Saves a bit of money and waste, and they can have more variety. But does she eat a lot of chips when we’re on the go? Yes.
In terms of entertaining your little one at a restaurant, it’s not an easy task and really depends on the place. We generally don’t decide where to go based on what’s ideal for her, so we’ve seen it all. The best places we’ve found are restaurants outside with not too many immediate dangers (stairs are my nemesis – she heads right for them) and with lots of space between the tables. In this sort of situation, Ines is very happy to potter about and play with toys, usually sticking fairly close to us naturally unless she’s feeling particularly adventurous. I try and limit the amount of time she’s in the highchair until she’s actually eating if possible, as wait times can be long and it can make them less likely to sit in there when the food actually arrives. The hardest are obviously small, loud restaurants where the tables are close. This is when I pull out the big guns, which is – you guessed it – a bit of screentime. Yes, I am sometimes that mum whose kid is watching something at the dinner table. And yes, sometimes I feel judgment or guilt about this, but more often than not I just say, f*ck it. I don’t want to disturb people at other tables, many of whom were having a special meal out or enjoying their own holiday, so the girl watches something. Again, she’s at an age where she can’t quite do other activities – colour, read a book quietly to herself – so we have to do what works for us now. When we were going to restaurants three times a day, she’d usually do okay during breakfast and lunch just interacting with us and playing near the table, but by the time we got to dinner, it was often necessary to keep her occupied. Staying in a holiday home is a nice way of avoiding some of this, though!
Play
With Ines still being so young, we don’t plan much around her in terms of the content of the holiday, or the activities. Obviously, we are more limited in what we can do, but we try to go about everything as normally as possible. I’m sure there will come a time when she will want to do certain things and ask for them, but while she is little and won’t remember much, we don’t make it a special priority to do specifically baby-friendly activities. I do find in general that a more active holiday can be more satisfying for everyone. When we’ve been on more relaxing, sunbathing-and-reading-geared holidays with Ines, the disparity between pre- and post-baby trips can be rather glaring. You usually have to trade-off between you and your partner for some chill time, but everyone can get quite bored quite quickly, especially if it’s too hot to walk anywhere, or you’re in the middle of nowhere. A lot of pool time can help here, and this picks up as they get older – Ines spent hours in the pool at Amangiri! A few days up to a week of this sort of vacation is nice but much longer is perhaps less fun, at least in my experience. More active holidays where you’re able to walk around with the buggy and sightsee, have little picnics together and just generally explore your surroundings I’ve found to be more successful for everyone. I forgot to take a carrier with me to America but I would definitely recommend taking one so you can take your little one on longer, less buggy-friendly walks.
As I say, I do bring toys and books with me wherever I go, but I also find Ines is not always interested in them and gets bored of the same selection day after day anyway. You know kids, they’ll just make a collection of random objects anyway, so you don’t need to overdo it I don’t think. In terms of which toys to bring, it might depend on your baby. For Ines, she likes small bags with little things inside that she can empty and refill. Stacking and nesting cups are always popular, too, and her little toy doll that she can do some pretend play with.
Packing
So what to pack!? How to pack? I will say I do tend to pack by the categories above – eat/play/sleep – so I don’t miss anything. I won’t go into a full-on packing list because we’ll be here forever, but here are a few of my travel items of choice (some affiliate links):
SlumberPod – Obviously I mentioned this above, it’s basically a blackout tent that goes over your baby’s cot. It’s an American product and I bought mine from eBay. I think the UK market is cottoning on a bit and there are some comparable products here now, too. I like this but as I say, only if we are going to a house. We need it less if we are in a hotel setting just because of the way our days pan out. Your baby might not even require blackout anything, of course!
Mountain Buggy clip-on highchair – I like this compact little clip-on highchair a lot. It’s good for some tighter settings where you need baby on a two-person table, for instance, and it’s very small and portable so you can shove it in the bottom of the buggy and forget about it for the most part. I will say everywhere in America we went had their own highchair, but in Edinburgh we totally struggled (go figure!) so it depends where you’re going and what you’re going to be doing, but having a clip-on one is a nice backup just in case.
My Little Coco ‘Everything Chair’ – This is like a little camp chair with a tray, so it works on the floor on its own, or you can put it on a normal dining chair and use it with or without the tray to get baby up to table level. We used this more often in America; at my Dad’s house it was more comfortable and sturdy than the clip-on as a semi-permanent fixture; in a hotel if we wanted to do room service or a quick breakfast in the room we would use this on the floor. Lots of people make these booster-style seats and they’re all much the same I’m sure, but I was impressed with this one.
Packing cubes – Packing is just a mess. No matter how many cubes you use, it’s never going to be perfect, especially on a long trip. But for baby clothes in particular, packing cubes are fantastic. Partly because they actually fit nicely in the cubes, and partly because kids’ clothes get out of control so much quicker than your own (just because they’re smaller? More difficult to fold?)
Nuna Sena Aire – We like this travel cot (I also have a breathable mattress I bought for it to make it that bit more comfortable), though I imagine there is very little difference between travel cots at the end of the day. We don’t take this on overseas trips.
BABYZEN YOYO – We use this a lot in London, too, but it’s a great little travel buggy and you can take it right onto the plane with you. It seems like everyone is making this sort of stroller though these days so might be worth doing some extra research. I know that you can also rent travel buggies, and I would recommend this if you don’t want to buy one because being able to use one straight onto and out of the plane is the best, especially when you’re in big airports.
Car seat – We usually take our home set up, including the base. I’ve tried researching travel car seats before but I feel happier just using the one we use here, especially as we did so much driving in the US and I wanted to be assured she was in a safe rear-facing setup with ISOFIX. There are different requirements for seats around the world so you’ll have to use your own judgement on what you’re willing to risk in terms of the regulations and how long you’ll be staying, but my greatest concern was her safety and what I felt comfortable with. You can get a car seat bag to protect it a bit which airlines should check for free on top of your luggage. I recommend taking a car seat and buggy separately (rather than a car seat on a chassis combo) because it means naps on the go in the stroller are much easier to achieve when you arrive. Also sidenote, you can be sneaky and shove a few extra bulky items into your car seat bag, like nappies for instance. When Ines was younger we liked to use the Cybex Cloud Z on our European trips because you could belt it in, too, so we didn’t have to take the base with us, and we weren’t doing much driving.
A final point: if you can, get your suitcases off the floor or out of reach. This one is more for a trip where you’re moving constantly from place to place. We really didn’t want Ines unpacking all our stuff every time we got to a new place, so Zak and I would come up with some pretty inventive solutions to keep suitcases as much out of reach as possible. Being strategic about how you pack so you don’t have to open every suitcase is helpful. You might get one (maybe two if you’re lucky!) fold-out luggage racks, so making use of those is good. Small ones can go inside wardrobes. I also had them underneath the bed sometimes. If your toddler can’t see the contents, so much the better.
Conclusion
Right my loves, that’s it! As I said I don’t think any of this is particularly revolutionary, but I hope it helps if you are wondering what works for us, and I hope, too, that it reassures you that it’s ok to let some things go in order to make travel happen for your family. It can be stressful and tiring, but as I say it can also be so worth it. And the more you do it, the more confident you’ll feel!
